Kai
Kai is an undead former Divine Assassin and the last of the Brunnen-G. He, along with Stanley Tweedle, Zev Bellringer and 790, accidentally steal the Lexx and flee the Cluster. __NOEDITSECTION__ __TOC__ Events prior to Season 1 Kai's backstory was expanded on in the episode "Brigadoom". Kai was a member of the Brunnen-G, the race who had defeated the Insect Civilisation in the Insect War. Kai was born on Brunnis-2 in the Light Universe. On his home world, the Brunnen-G thrived, developing ever more impressive technologies until they discovered a cure for death itself, granting their entire race immortality. This breakthrough proved to be a curse however, as their people descended into acute paranoia, erecting a powerful energy shield around their world and living in constant fear of death, hiding in their homes and building elaborate protective structures underground. This persisted until Kai, one of the restless Newborn, rebelled against the isolationist society with the help of his Brethren. Kai's lover disagreed with this, and told Kai outright that she would not wait for him should he leave. Bidding her goodbye, Kai ventured out through a gap in the diminishing shield to consult the Time Prophet about the fate of his people. There it was revealed to him that the Brunnen-G would be destroyed by the Divine Order, and that the last of the Brunnen-G would in turn destroy His Divine Shadow, a prophecy that will shape the history of his people. Confronted with this news, many of the Brunnen-G people refused to believe it, thinking themselves safe behind, what had once been, an impenetrable energy shield. Kai was instead sentenced to grow old, and eventually die, for what was perceived as an act of sedition. The younger members however rallied behind Kai nonetheless, and readied what defences they could. Rejoined by his lover, Kai escaped from prison and, with the help of the Newborn, rallied what little defences they could, knowing full well there was no way to fight against the Divine Order. As the Brunnen-G waited for death, the Newborn took a few remaining derelict fighters left over from the Insect Wars and flew off on a suicide run in a last act of defiance against the Divine Order. Kai died 2008 years before the events of the Lexx premiere episode , defending his home planet Brunnis-2 with the help of his fellow Brunnen-G warriors against attack by His Divine Shadow's personal flagship. This valiant but desperate defense failed and His Divine Shadow destroyed the Brunnen-G home world. Knowing all was lost, Kai rammed his small fighter craft into the control pod of the Foreshadow in an attempt to destroy His Divine Shadow. Though he succeeded in ramming the pod, Kai did no significant damage, instead catapulting himself out of his cockpit and directly in front of His Shadow, who stabbed Kai and drained his memories. Instead of having Kai's carcass incinerated, His Shadow had him "de-carbonized" and turned into a Divine Assassin, a nearly unstoppable killing machine in the direct service of His Shadow. As an undead assassin/ex-assassin, Kai's uniform is a blackened version of the colorful clothing the Brunnen-G had worn; his beehive hairdo, however, remains unchanged. For the next 2000 years, Kai killed an untold number of heretics and revolutionaries in His Shadow's name. Season 1 Episode 1.1: "I Worship His Shadow" Kai is awakened by the most recent Divine Shadow in order to exterminate Thodin and prevent the hijacking of the Lexx by the Ostral-B heretics. The Time Prophet had made a prophecy that the Brunnen-G would destroy the Divine Order and, with Kai being the last of the Brunnen-G, the responsibility fell on his shoulders. The current incarnation of His Divine Shadow refused to believe in the prophecy and called Kai to action as an assassin to mock the prophecy and show his own mastery of the Universe. However, in doing so the Shadow unintentionally fulfills the Prophecy. Kai arrives at the Lexx just as Thodin and his team are about the steal the Lexx. Thodin, passes the Key to his first mate before engaging Kai in combat. Though Kai is nearly successful in his duty, he is called away by the Divine Predecessors, former incarnations of His Shadow whose brains have been preserved, who are under attack by a cluster lizard, a vicious animal which feasts on the flesh of the living and has a particular taste for brains. When Kai picks up a piece of the brain of the Divine Predecessor that killed him, he regains his memories and his free will. He later joins Stanley Tweedle, Zev Bellringer and 790 onboard the Lexx. Episode 1.2: "Super Nova" In the hopes of extending Kai’s un-life Zev suggests they go to Brunnis, the original home of the Brunnen-G. However the only thing they find there are holographic recordings left by the “Poet Man”. Kai is accidentally cut in half and has his memory stored in holographic form in the databanks below, however he is reconstituted by Stan, unfortunately the Divine Predecessors have stolen the Lexx and left them to die in the supernova of the Brunnis star. They are then rescued by the Brunnis star and an unfamiliar blue star who state that it is "not their time to die". Episode 1.3: "Eating Pattern" Out of energy, Zev and Stan bury the apparently-dead Kai on a planet inhabited by Satellite worms. The worms only use living tissue for hosts so they leave Kai alone, however the substance excreted by the worms acts in a similar way to Protoblood and Kai is revived long enough to kill the queen and rescue Stan and Zev. Episode 1.4: "Giga Shadow" To resupply Kai’s Protoblood, the crew travel back to the Cluster, only to find it deserted as a result of “The Cleansing”, in preparation for the birth of the Gigashadow, the last survivor of the Insect Civilization after the Insect War and a sworn enemy of humanity, who coincidentally also happens to produce Protoblood from a gland. Kai happens to be present at the birth of a Squish, a Cluster Lizard, who assumes Kai to be its mother. He later calls Squish "My baby". Squish kills the Gigashadow by burrowing into its brain, before the Lexx fires upon the Fractal Core through which it had escaped, destroying it completely. Season 2 Kai, possessed by His Divine Shadow, leads the crew back to the Light Zone to retrieve an insect larva from the remains of the cluster under the pretext that he needs more protoblood. His shadow's essence passes into that of the insect and is accidentally merged with bio-vizier Mantrid. (Mantrid) Kai is awoken incorrectly and punctures Stan’s heart. (Terminal) A group of restless and none-too-intelligent teens (Enox, Gibble, Kanana, Laleen, and Tad) comes aboard the Lexx, and after ‘partying like stink’ one of them accidentally reprograms Kai to become a psychotic killing machine. Kai then sets to work systematically murdering each of the teens, taking an uncharacteristic delight in violence. After hunting and killing his prey one by one, Xev and Stan fear they may have to abandon the Lexx forever only to be saved when Kai runs out of Protoblood. (Waking the Dead) When Mandrid’s drones destroy 790, Kai uses a protein generator and some of his Protoblood to keep him alive. After Lexx was forced to land on Ruuma to save Stan’s life, the same power that animate the discarded corpses of the Divine Predecessors causes Kai to speak in rhymes and cull flowers. When Xev tries to get Kai to give her the Squalker to call for help, Kai chucks it off of a cliff. (Twilight) After Stan and Xev become trapped in Stan’s nightmares by the Narco-Lounger, Kai goes in to rescue them both. (Patches in the Sky) Kai accidentally becomes the main character in an elaborate musical production detailing the history of the Brunnen-G when the crew explore a strange, floating theatre in space, with Xev as his unnamed lover. He appears as he did when he was alive. (Brigadoom) Season 3 After being adrift for 4332 years, Lexx comes into orbit of the planets Fire and Water. a When the leader of Fire, Prince, heads an expedition in a balloon to intercept the Lexx and kidnaps Stan and Xev, Kai wakes up, repairs 790, who becomes fixated upon him, and then (having no moth) he decides to long-jump down to planet Water, to find the crew. (Fire and Water) On planet Water, Kai finds the beautiful May; the lone survivor of an attack on a Water city. He requisitions an attacking gondola, and sails over to planet Fire. (May) After waking the moth breeders Kai goes to Gametown in search of food for the Lexx. Unfortunately Fifi betrays everyone and steals all the food and moths and takes them to Prince. (Gametown) After Duke and Fifi raze Gametown to the ground and kill everyone in it, Kai requisitions an attacking moth and heads over to Boomtown with Bunny and Xev. In boomtown, Bunny makes several attempts to go to bed with Kai, which he finally deters only by removing his left hand to prove that he is not alive. Duke and Fifi then burn Boomtown. (Boomtown) The moth, now crippled, falls to Fire in the night, along with Fifi and Duke. They will all fry if they don’t reach a city by sunrise. Bunny, Xev, Stan and the two Kai’s find a wrecked Gondola and try to pump it up. During their flight they realise that there is not enough fuel to make it across the lava lakes unless there is less weight, and Protoblood Kai volunteers to jump overboard and walk on foot. Stan, Xev and Bunny then make it to K-Town, but then have to ward off the attacks of human Kai, who is really Prince in disguise, and Fifi. (Gondola) Kai eventually climbs the tower and finds Stan and Xev, only to have a systems failure. Stan and Xev then meet a reincarnated Mandrid, who participates in Kai’s diagnosis procedure, does something stupid, and then Kai cleanses him. Xev and Stan manage to throw Kai off the tower to realign him, but it doesn’t work and he is captured. (K-Town) Kai is brought before “The Commission”, who, in a room full of candles, endeavour to civill interrogate him, exploring his human evil. Kai is not interested and requests to be thrown off the tower. The adjudicatrix asks him whether he has ever killed anyone as an assassin. Kai then delivers his famous speech: “I have killed mothers with their babies. I have killed great philosophers and proud young warriors. I have done this in the service of His Divine Shadow, and I have never shown any mercy. I have killed the evil and the good, the weak and the beautiful, but it’s been a while since I’ve killed a room full of petty bureaucrats.” (Tunnels) Prince, in Xev’s image, tries to find a way to get to the Lexx. When Prince comes up with a plan to get Stan to give up the key during intercourse, Kai becomes suspicious and Kisses Xev twice to see if she kisses like the real Xev. After obtaining the key, she commands Lexx to destroy Water but Kai kills her and the key flows back to a dismayed Stan. (The Key) Kai and Stan search for Xev in a moth, finding her dehydrated and stranded, but alive, under a city spire. They fly down to the Garden and meet three women (Tulip, Lilly and Daffodil) who spend their day tending stamens and other flower plants. In an atmosphere of serenity, Kai decides he will plant himself and decompose. Meanwhile, Stan has the girls recreate Lyekka from his memories. (Garden) After Lyekka is killed (again) and Xev is kidnapped, Kai requisitions an attacking balloon. From there, they engage in a battle of wits with Prince and his offside, (later known as Priest). They make it back to the Lexx and begin a search for Xev again, who is walking through the desert. (Battle) With no further news on Xev, Stan and Kai search for her in Girltown. Whilst Stan is busy trying to stop the reincarnated head of Giggerota from stealing his body, Kai liberates a group of drag queen slaves making balloons, who later get eaten by the Lexx. Stan and Kai fall to the planet water, and Kai, as predicted, sinks like a stone. (Girltown) Xev launches a search and rescue for them, but Stan drowns and Kai continues to the centre of Water, encountering many souls on the way. He then slips through a light-hole leading to another Gametown. (The Beach) Xev retrieves Kai, who then dives to the centre of Fire to rescue Stan, who went to hell. He has a little chat with Prince, who shows him Stanley in the red vortex evil soul repository, where they patiently await rotational incarnate torture, with Prince for the rest of eternity. Xev rescues Kai and Stan’s soul by destroying Fire and freeing the souls in the repository, before Prince’s unbound consciousness takes control of Lexx long enough to destroy water. With everything back to normal, the Lexx crew fly to the far side of the sun to a little blue-green planet. (Heaven and Hell) Season 4 In season 4, the Lexx crew reach Earth, a planet which, being a class 13 planet at the very centre of the Dark Zone, they had assumed would be a very scary place. There, they discover Prince has reincarnated as Isambard Prince, head of the ATF, along with other people they knew. The rest of the season take place on or around Earth. (Little Blue Planet) Kai and Zev head to Earth in a moth, which is shot down by stealth fighters. A SETI scientist, Dr Longbore (a reincarnation of Wozzard from series 2) becomes fascinated with Kai and details him on the Earth's imminent demise due to Higgs Boson research. (Texx Lexx) Tina tries to seduce Kai while showing him pictures of Transylvania. (Xevivor) The Lexx crew go to the pub and Kai becomes a piano man and plays endless variations of "Yo Way Yo", and recieves a standing ovation. (The Rock) Kai takes the crew to Transylania to satisfy his curiosity. In the tavern, they bump into bats, superstitious villagers, Van Helsing, and 3 goth girls. They are invited to the castle for the Walpurgis feast, which is hosted by a British actor playing Dracul. Kai is trapped in a spiked coffin by Grenfield, the owner. The goth girls do various things to Xev and Stan, and then stamp on Dracul's plastic teeth. Stan incites a riot back at the tavern. The castle is stormed, and Dracul is killed (ex contract). The goths wake Vlad with a sample of protoblood.(Walpurgis Night) Xev meets a mortal Kai who is a rather extreme method actor. Unfortunately for Xev, he wants celibacy until his show has run (2 – 6 months). Xev eats him anyway, in a fit of cluster lizard hormones. (Fluff Daddy) Vlad escapes from the cryo unit and proceeds to suck the life out of Kai, and then Stan gets up the courage to kill Vlad using the druid's staff. Stan then patches up Xev's body the best he can. (Magic Baby) Kai is turned into a joyful singing tree as part of Oberon's scheme to marry Xev for 1500 years. This is reversed when Titania marries him instead. (A Midsummer's Nightmare) The carrot probes invade US supermarkets, and leading scientists analyse how the carrots penetrate their hosts. 790 sides with the carrot to eliminate everyone but Kai. Prince teaches him Chess, and offers a wager. Kai demonstrates his increasing cynicism about 790 and works out what is going on. (Bad Carrot) Kai runs out of Protoblood. (769) The crew buy a house in Prime Ridge, using money from ATMs that 790 rigs for them. Xev's cooking is atrocious, Kai doesn't like his new fridge, and after a day they get bored of TV. Kai starts running out of protoblood, gives druggies all the money, and starts acting as high as they are. Everyone is a gun wielding psycho, and the episode ends in a massive shootout; Prime Ridge is ruined, and the druggies take off in the moth, leaving the gang no option but to use the neighbor's car for a getaway. (Prime Ridge) Fleeing from the authorities, with exhausted Kai in a shopping trolly, Xev and Stan shelter in a funeral parlour run by Mort. Mort is assembling his "unofficial" girlfriend, Deedee, from spare parts. He rejects Xev's breasts only on blood type, and becomes fascinated by Kai's protoblood, which Kai readily donates. On Lexx, 790 will not cooperate because Kai cannot speak. Meanwhile Xev fends off deputy Festus with promises of sex, but she gives him re-animated Deedee instead. Deedee then kills Mort in the name of His Divine Shadow. (Mort) On the run Xev, Stan and Kai are abducted by Moss (in a reincarnation from season 2), head of the AFR. Using information from them, he masquerades as Prince, and installs himself as the head of the ATF. He then puts the crew on a show trial for being in league with Prince, where he plays all legal roles, then decides to execute them. Prince (residing in his TV set) directs Bunny to read a note to the Idaho AFR, who then ride a moth to the ATF, and shoot all the AFR. (Moss) With the experience of a partially played chess game against Prince, Kai plays for his soul, against the lives of Stan and Xev. He is confident of winning and enters the game willingly, much to Stan and Xev's objection. He plays a game of deception, and bets he can make Prince overconfident. Kai wins, but gains nothing. (The Game) Out near the orbit of Jupiter, the crew encounter a Russian space pod full of students, whose only agenda is to get onto the Lexx and commandeer it. Except Haley. Haley, with the trust fund, has been conned and used by the rest of them, and thinks she is on a mission against "the corporations". One of the girls has the hots for Kai, so 790 sees his chance to eliminate everybody by manipulating Haley. He guides her to a Black Pack weapon, and drives her into a killing spree – because it feels good. (Haley's Comet) The crew have to kill a day before the next shuttle flight, so Bunny suggests Las Vegas. The Egyptian themed hotel they stay in just happens to be storing the mummy of a philosopher poet called Drago, that Kai dispatched ages ago. The mummy goes on a killing spree. We learn that Kai has also killed "the pedantic, and the pseudo intellectual." (Viva Lexx Vegas) The cryo control is wrecked and Kai mentions that he only has "days, a few weeks at best" of protoblood left. (Trip) Kai and Xev land near where a "Lyekka" asteroid hit near the coast of Japan, and meet the monks of a Buddhist monastery. There, Xev learns of "inner pieces"; her organs nearly harvested by the "Master". A Godzilla-sized Lyekka comes out of the sea and starts devastating Tokyo. Kai slays her, and Lexx blasts the walking asteroid that emerges afterwards. The last few minutes of the episode are prematurely feel-good, as Stan decides to head away from Earth forever. (Lyekka vs Japan) Out of spite, Longbore has left a Higgs Boson accelerator to destroy everything before Preist and Bunny take his ship full of schoolgirls (the Noah) and fry him. The aliens start tearing into Earth using moon-sized tentacled asteroids. At the end of the final season, Isambard Prince, former ruler of Planet Fire, restores Kai to life after promising it as a prize in a chess game. Prince visits the Lexx as a self-proclaimed omen of death, which Kai "feels" is meant for him. Kai says farewell to Xev and Stan before leaving Earth, apologizing to Xev for never being able to love her the way she wanted and they kiss. Fulfilling his own prophecy, Prince restores Kai to life only minutes before Kai sacrifices himself to destroy the asteroid-ship harboring Lyekka and her kind, and seconds before the destruction of Earth. Kai, Xev and Stan take three Moths to search for a way into the asteroid ship as the Lexx begins to crumble into dust. Unable to see anything inside the alien ship Xev and Stan find themselves back outside when its opening closes, Kai however makes it inside, suffering injuries and singing Yo Way Yo for one final time as he crashes his moth into the alien ship's core. Kai is last seen flying through the interior of the asteroid with a particle collider, singing the Brunnen-G Fight Song, and finally crashing at the asteroid core with the device. Surviving the crash and finally alive, but next to the about-to-explode particle collider, the last shot is Kai laughing in irony at the similarity of his death with his original death as the accelerator's Higgs Boson value is determined as 1313131313... and explodes, destroying the Lyekka meteorite, as Xev and Stan escape, grief stricken, before the mass of the ship then collapses back in on itself into a super dense particle. (Yo Way Yo) Kai Out Of Character Kai is an undead former assassin and thus has no emotions. But in some scenes or in whole episodes he acts out of character for various reasons. Season 1: *In the opening scene of the first episode of the first season ("I Worship His Shadow", 1.1) Kai is still alive and therefore he acts as a living man. *In "Gigashadow" (1.4) he seems to develop some paternal feelings for Squish, a newborn clusterlizzard. When Squish kills the Gigashadow, Kai proudly says "My baby!" Season 2: *In "Mantrid" (2.1) he feels motivated to get protoblood despite having acclaimed sooner not to have motivations. It turns out that the motivation came from the remnant of the Gigashadow in his body. *In "Terminal" (2.2) Kai is incorrectly awoken by Stan and he punctures Stan's heart. *In "Lafftrak" (2.5) Kai gently plays with a balloon, reminiscing about his joy for them while alive. *In "Wake The Dead" (2.10) one of the guests on board the Lexx accidentally reprograms Kai to become a psychotic killing machine. Also his hairdo gets mussed. *In "Twilight" (2.13) the crew visits the planet Ruuma because Stan is ill. The planet has a strange effect on Kai; he acts as if he were high. He talks in rhymes and enjoys culling flowers. *In "Brigadoom" (2.18), the musical episode, Kai acts like the living Kai on stage and sings songs. Season 3: *In Season 3 Kai jumps out of the Lexx onto the surface of the planet Fire for having no moth. Consequently he suffers from some systemfailures and malfunctions. *In "Boomtown" (3.4) Xev meets a living Kai besides the dead Kai. They flee together with a gondola. *In "Gondola" (3.5) it turns out that the living Kai is the reincarnated Prince, who can take any shape on reincarnation. *In "The Key" (3.8) Kai kisses Xev twice. He does this only to be sure that it is not Xev but Prince, who took her shape. After the second kiss he kills "Xev", i.e. Prince. *The dead real Kai has a short appearance in "The Beach" (3.12). While Kai sinks deep into the ocean of Water he meets his dead spirit, who is stuck there for Kai is still undead. Season 4: *In "A Midsummer's Nightmare" (4.11) Kai and Xev are converted by Oberon to joyfully singing trees. *In "Fluff Daddy" (4.9) Xev meets the living Kai on Earth. He is an actor who lives for his art and citates Shakespeare and Goethe (in German). *In "Mort" (4.15) Kai is running out of protoblood and therefore becomes helpless. Xev and Stan have to transport him in a shopping cart. *In "Yo Way Yo" (4.24) Kai is granted mortality by Prince and dies again, killing the last remnant of the Insect Civilization. Trivia *The TV Tropes for Kai are, "Last of the Proud Warrior Race", "Emotionless, Indestructible Dragon", "The Spock", "Healing Factor" "Grappling Hook Pistol", "Our Vampires are Different" "Last of his kind", "Spock Speak", and "Warrior Poet". *Kai is somewhat immune to death as he has been blasted by Black Packs with no visible effect, and sliced apart only to put himself back together. However the Divine Shadow's Ephemeral Wave seemed to have rather debilitating effects on Kai, to the point of slowing him down and causing him to drop. *As a corpse, Kai apparently cannot swim and will sink to the bottom of an ocean like a stone. *Theme Music: There are several pieces of music that play in relation to Kai; Cryochamber from the Tales from a Parallel Universe Soundtrack, Supernova from the Cluster of Music Soundtrack, and Yo-Way-Yo a the Brunnen-G theme that plays throughout the series. *Catchphrases. Usually as respond to a question Kai makes a statement about what the dead can not do. These statements usually begin with "The dead do not.." or "I do not ..". See: Kai/The dead do not *The character of Kai is played by Michael McManus References * Michael McManus on wikipedia * Michael McManus on IMDb * Michael McManus as Kai Category:characters Category:Divine Order Category:Brunnen-G/images